made itself felt at the beginning of the epoch of which we 

 write, and accomplished marvels in the abatement of super- 

 stition. The most pflfcctivp Rffent, however, in exterminating 

 the superstitious features of natural science was the intro- 

 dulrHoirjntoevery branch of study of the experimental method 

 of investigation. 



^TEe doctrines of astrology were being gradually under- 

 mined by discoveries of astronomical laws at variance with 

 the ancient theories ; although Tycho Brahe and John Kepler, 

 to amuse and oblige their eccentric patron Rudolph, practiced 

 divination by the stars, they were formulating at the same 

 time the fundamental laws of their motions, laws which 

 demonstrated the fallacy of a belief in the correlation of pla- 

 nets and terrestrial events, either national or personal. When 

 Brahe calculated the path of the comet of 1577 he proved 

 that the stars, sun and planets could not possibly be carried 

 around in huge spheres of impenetrable crystal, revolving, 

 orb within orb, every twenty -four hours. When Kepler by 

 severe mathematical analysis defended the system of Coper- 

 nicus, the 



"Best endow'd and bravest Pole of Poles," 



he had to combat the prevalent notion that each planet is 

 directed in its movements and carried around the earth by 

 an angel; "in that case," he said, "the orbits would be per- 

 fectly circular, but the elliptic form which we find in them 

 rather smacks of the lever and material necessity." 



"Kopernik fix'd the Sun, the work began; 

 And Kepler raised the time-infolding plan." 



Alchemy, after astrology, probably contributed more di- 

 rectly than any other of the six follies of science towards the 

 advancement of the genuine science associated with it. The 

 zealous searchers for the secrets of transmutation, stimulated 



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